Salamander interview:

1: Tell us a bit about yourself and your background. How long have you been making music?

I had no real background in music growing up, besides messing around on an old electric keyboard which I still have lying around somewhere… I was encouraged to play music, but for some reason I never took anything up. I preferred video games, mostly. But with no musical background to speak of I did eventually find inspiration elsewhere. When I was about 18-19 years old there were two records that had a big impact on me: Black Dice’s “Beaches and Canyons” and Animal Collective’s “Here Comes the Indian” – each conjured up an actual alternate world of sound like nothing I’d heard before – even now I still find it hard to pinpoint their ancestors – “Beaches and Canyons” especially has no musicality to it in the traditional sense, it’s more like the soundscape to some unseen dimension… an actual field recording plucked out of the space-time fabric of somewhere beyond logic, and I guess subconsciously they motivated me to experiment with my own unrealized ideas and imaginings.

So I guess I really started trying to make music maybe five years ago now… just beginning with my computer, Windows Media Sound Recorder, a broken plastic headset mic, and Audacity. I still use Audacity… but I’ve upgraded the other parts. 

2: The album was recorded solely by you (and a few guest appearances). lately Salamander live shows have included Chris Last and collaborations with others (Solar Barge etc). Do you see more collaborations for future shows/recordings?

Well Chris, my brother, is part of Salamander now, and he’ll be writing future albums with me and continuing to play the live shows. I’d like to collaborate with other musicians for future recordings, sure. Mainly I want more live instruments in future releases and less sampled ones, so collaborations will be necessary on that front – anything from gongs, guitars, marimbas, sitars, horns and woodwinds may be necessary. 

3: Salamander live shows have always had a strong focus on visuals, is this an area you would like to explore further?

For sure – the visual element is essential with this project and won’t ever diminish in importance. I really want to create total sensory environments – where sight, sound and even smell are all activated at once and in deliberate synchronization. Future releases will have visual DVDs attached, and for the live show I just want to increase the scale of things as much as possible. More speakers, more screens, more involved lighting, and even live choreographed dancers/acrobats, like Cirque du Soleil but even more trippy, if that’s possible…

4: Please tell us about the album title ‘JAWS OF THE VISE’ and what it means.

‘Vise’ is an oldstyle spelling for Vice. The title refers to an old theory (from Elie de Beaumont in 1852) within the field of Orogeny, which deals with the movement of tectonic plates and how they are responsible for deformations in the Earth’s crust. Basically tectonic plates crush inwards like a vice and cause the earth to thrust upwards to form mountains, islands, volcanoes, etc… which sets the scene for the world in which the album takes place.

5: Tell us about the 2 launch shows planned for the album and ideas you have for future live shows/performances

Well the launch shows are at Dada Records (Jan 22nd) and Velvet Lounge (Jan 25th) – except for one song, the two sets will feature entirely different material from one another. Also most of what we’re playing isn’t from Jaws of the Vise… visuals will be there as usual, with scenes of evolution, life devouring life, machines destroying humans, viruses propagating, spaceships exploding and we’re also experimenting with a projector-based dream machine, which is a stroboscopic light that you sit in front of with your eyes closed, allowing shapes and images to emerge like mutating creatures out of a white pulsating void. After the launches we want to take a break from the live shows for a bit and do some proper recordings of the new tracks we’ve been playing live. But I want to start doing live shows in places outside of venues/bars. I have a P.A. now and I’d like to do gigs in parks, pedestrian tunnels, old warehouses, and underground areas (if I can find any) – also a movie theater would be good. 

6: Finally please tell us about some of your favourite Perth/Australian/International acts that are inspiring you

Favorite Perth acts would be the Usurpers of Modern Medicine, French Rockets,  These Shipwrecks, Solar Barge, and Adam Trainer, amongst many others. 

Australian: No Zu (Melb) Spoonbill (Melb) Lawrence English (Bris), based mainly off the last performance I saw of his at Club Zho.

International: Animal Collective (ceaselessly), Matmos, Fever Ray, Astral Social Club, Forest Swords, Stag Hare and Alog.